Sennin
by Mr. Cereal
Summary: The rise of the Snake, the Toad, and the Slug. Abandoned.
1. Enter Team Sarutobi!

The pale robed boy stared down at the plaque, not moving, not saying a thing. The gentle spring breeze blew across the plain, ruffling the grass, and his long, slightly feminine hair. His parents had been killed by a venomous snake while traveling through a forest. He was bitten too, but by some inexplicable quirk of fate or biology, he was spared, and had exhibited no apparent side effect.

A young man stood a little behind the boy. His hair looked windblown, and he had a thick goatee growing on his chin. He had found the boy along a road, weak, disoriented and without any memory of who he was. Sarutobi-san found his parents' remains nearby. He brought the boy back to Konohagakure, and gave him the name "Orochimaru", in commemoration of his surviving the lethal snake bite.

Presently the newly-named Orochimaru spotted something near the edge of the plaque. Crouching down, he saw a white snake slithering away. It left behind a shell that resembled itself. Hesitantly, he reached out to gently pick up the delicate skin. "What's this thing?" he asked Sarutobi.

Sarutobi's eyebrows cocked up. "Ooh! That's a white snake's molted skin!"

"I've never seen one before."

The older man chuckled. "Me neither. They're extremely rare, hard to find."

Orochimaru was curious now. "How come it's white?"

Sarutobi thought for a while, and then shrugged. "I don't actually know…… no one really thought to find out…… but for years, they've been considered a symbol of good fortune, and rebirth."

Orochimaru seemed transfixed by the molted skin, caressing it lightly with his finger. "Good fortune…… and rebirth…"

"The fact that you found it by your parents' grave must be a sign," Sarutobi said, half-intending to console the boy. "Perhaps they've been reborn in new bodies, so that someday, when you've grown up, they can see you again."

There was a slight pause. "When's that going to be?"

Sarutobi chuckled again. "I'm afraid I don't know that either." _Only you can know that._

But it seemed that Orochimaru had hardly heard him. He was lost in thought, still staring at the talisman in his cupped hands. Slowly, a little smile crept up his pallid face.

* * *

"I decline!" the blonde-haired girl huffed, turning her head away. 

"But, Tsunade-hime……" the boy lapsed into silence. "Hmph……flat-chested hag……" he muttered under his breath.

The kunoichi's temple twitched visibly. "Excuse me?" her eyes fixed on her teammate, cracking her knuckles menacingly. The boy, losing his patience, yelled out, "YOU FLAT-CHESTED HAG!" sticking out his tongue for good measure, which earned him a solid punch on the head.

"Tsunade, Jiraiya," their sensei called out from behind, "stop it, both of you." The boy called Jiraiya started whining. "But Sarutobi-sensei, she started it…" He was interrupted by Tsunade, "Shut up, dead last!"

Sarutobi sighed. _How troublesome._ As the pair continued their bickering, Sarutobi let his attention wander back to the other member of the three-man team. Orochimaru walked on his own, in silence, a few feet away. In the few months since he found him, the pale boy had shown tremendous progress. Originally, Sarutobi had planned for him to be graduate two years later, but he showed astonishing growth, from knowing no ninja arts at all a few months ago, to a level on par with most Academy graduates. What took a normal student three years, it took Orochimaru three months. _Not even I finished the course so fast._ Sarutobi himself had been a prodigy, completing the Academy courses in ten months.

Even so, Sarutobi did not expect Orochimaru to hold up so well during the bell test. In fact, he surpassed the other two in terms of performance, even come close to getting the bell from him on his own. _Who knows what might be achieved in a few years' time……_

"I wouldn't go out with you for all the ramen in the world!" Tsunade exclaimed. Pointing to Orochimaru, she further emphasized the point. "I-I would rather go with Orochimaru!"

Jiraiya's face fell. "Whaaat? With him? What so good about _him_?" Jiraiya said, sending glares of jealousy towards the indifferent boy.

Tsunade stole a glance towards the lone figure of Orochimaru. _Actually, he's not bad-looking either……_ She shook herself. Nah. Imposssible.

* * *

**A/N: This is the prologue to a multichapter fanfic about the Legendary Sannin. I would appreciate comments on how to improve the story, and such. Constructive criticism is most welcome. As some of you may have noticed, the first portion is directly adapted from pages 15-16 of Chapter 344. Hope that's not breaking the rules or anything.**


	2. Ambushed

Tsunade groaned. She had been waiting for Sarutobi-sensei and Jiraiya to arrive for almost an hour now. They had a B-rank mission to scout out the size of an invading Iwagakure army. They weren't exactly ideal for stealth, but Konohagakure, with the defeat at Bear Valley, was hard-pressed for manpower. Her other teammate had arrived, though. In fact, Orochimaru arrived even earlier than Tsunade. He always did.

The ever-pale boy spoke up from his seat beside the window. "They'll arrive soon, I'm sure." Tsunade walked to the window, leaning on the sill. "They'd better…… Hokage-sama said that this was a B-rank mission," she mused, "and that army sounds pretty serious." She sneaked a glance at Orochimaru. He was lost in his own thoughts, as usual. He had been very quiet for as long as she knew him. Sarutobi-sensei said that Orochimaru was the only survivor of a snake attack.

A breeze wafted into the room, blowing a strand of Orochimaru's long hair across his face. For some reason, ever since Tsunade knew Orochimaru, since the bell test about one year ago, she had been strangely attracted to him, even when he showed himself to possess something of a sadistic streak. "Orochimaru……"

Someone muttered into Tsunade's ear. "What are you doing, Tsunade-chan?" She started and jerked sideways, nearly stumbling. When she regained her composure, she saw Jiraiya's grinning face upside down outside the window. "Jiraiya! Stop screwing around, jeez!"

The boy with two lines painted below his eyes burst out laughing. "I scared you, didn't I, Tsunade-chan?"

Sarutobi-sensei walked through the door. "Sorry we were late, we had, ah, important business."

Orochimaru smirked. "Yeah, right. I bet you and Jiraiya were peeping at women again, sensei."

"You're just sour because you don't _like_ women," huffed Jiraiya.

Orochimaru narrowed his eyes. It had hit a nerve. "Say that again, and I'll kill you."

"Alright, alright. Let's get going already." Jiraiya said. As Orochimaru exited the room, Jiraiya stuck out his tongue at him.

* * *

The ANBU captain looked around warily as he landed on a tree branch. _No danger._ He nodded to his team as a signal. His team appeared in front of him. "I've scouted ahead, and it seems that the Iwa army has already crossed and is holding the bridge. We'll need to find another way to cross that ravine." The four-man ANBU cell had been tasked to deliver a vital message to a Konoha army in a fort about ten clicks north of the Iwa army. If the army could coordinate itself with a shinobi force massing just outside Konohagakure, the Iwa army could be caught in a pincer movement.

"We could overpower the squad guarding the bridge-" one of them began.

"No. If we do that, we will alert the enemy to our plans. We are ANBU." another said. "We could use genjutsu, though,"

"Not that either," the captain said. "There are too many unknowns, like the skill of the shinobi guarding the bridge, and the number of them. We take the other bridge about half a day's journey from here."

"Understood, Danzo-taicho." his team confirmed in unison.

* * *

Danzo threw a kunai to deflect one aimed at him. _Booby trap!_ An expert trap-layer himself, Danzo was extremely alert of his surroundings, constantly assessing spots that might be useful for laying traps. This quality, along with an unyielding militarism, had caused his meteoric rise among the ANBU ranks.

However, that trap was only the first one. There was a telltale deep whoosh. "Duck!" he barked at his team, himself jumping down from the canopy. One of his team was too slow. Dozens of kunai struck the ANBU. Danzo's eyes widened as he saw the explosive tags attached to the end of all the kunai. Before he had a chance to shield his eyes, his teammate exploded in a dazzling flash of light.

"Shiro is down," he said matter-of-factly as he and the rest of his team landed on the ground. Suddenly, a voice boomed out. "Doton, Doro Kasui! (Earth Element, Mud Spikes!)" Numerous deadly-looking stalagmites erupted from the ground, impaling the two remaining ANBU that was his team. Fortunately, Danzo was near the edge of the jutsu, so he quickly leapt away.

"Doton, Kekkai Doroutoumu! (Earth Element, Destructive Mud Prison!)" A solid dome of mud grew from the ground, trapping Danzo's entire left arm and leg. _Shit! I should have seen this coming! _He felt the scroll in a pocket on his shoulder. _Good. It's still with me._

"Gotcha, you irritating little Konoha worm. Now hand over that scroll, and I'll grant you a quick death." a ninja with an Iwagakure forehead protector said. Even in his state, Danzo counted at least two dozen, but probably more, shinobi hidden in the trees around the clearing. He smirked in his ANBU mask. "You will never lay your hands on the scroll, slime!" Before the Iwa-nin could do anything, he reached into a pocket, and got an explosive tag between his index and middle fingers. Still smirking, he formed a one-handed seal. "Katsu!" Danzo yelled, infusing chakra forcibly into the explosive tag.

There was a deafening blast, accompanied by excruciating pain. Danzou gritted his teeth. _Yes, I did it. The scroll's secret is safe._ His entire right arm, with the scroll, had been blown off. Although he couldn't see, hear, or move very much, he chuckled defiantly, tasting the metallic tang of blood in his mouth.

As his sight and hearing returned, Danzo knew that his right eye had been incapacitated. The Iwa-nin brought down his ninjato on him, his face twisted in anger. _This is the end, I guess._ He closed his eyes. He had lived a good life. Now he would die a good death, for Konoha.

But the blow did not fall. Danzo opened his eyes weakly. A man was standing in front of him, blocking the Iwa-nin's katana with a long staff. _That's……_ "Sarutobi……" he acknowledged his saviour before passing out.

* * *

**  
A/N: I made some changes to this chapter, mostly minor, such as changing _"Danzou"_ to _"Danzo"_, adding or excising some sentences, etc. Otherwise the chapter remains like it did before.**


	3. Rescue

Tsunade groaned

"Sarutobi…" Danzo acknowledged weakly.

"Don't strain yourself now," Sarutobi said, pushing back the Iwa-nin's katana with his staff, the Kongōnyoi. A young kunoichi crouched down beside Danzo's battered body. "He's hurt really bad, Sarutobi-sensei," Tsunade said, quickly assessing the damage.

"Just try to patch him up as much as possible," Sarutobi snapped. Tsunade nodded, doing a series of hand seals. She bit her thumb, and slammed it to the ground. "Kuchiyose no jutsu!" A white slug, almost two metres long, appeared in a poof of smoke. It had large blue patches on its skin. "Let's get to work, Katsuuya," Tsunade said, her hands glowing with a gentle blue light.

As Tsuande and Katsuuya were busy saving Danzo, Sarutobi stepped back a few paces, performing hand seals, his fingers a blur of rapid movement. "Katon, Karyuu Endan!(Fire Element, Fire Dragon Flame Missle!)" A wide arc of fire shot out from his mouth, incinerating everything in front. The Iwa-nin tried to get away, but was caught in the inferno.

About a dozen other Iwa-nins emerged from the surrounding foliage, but Sarutobi detected at least twenty more hiding in the trees. One of them spoke. "Give it up, shinobi! You are outnumbered!"

"Ha! As if that matters! Kuchiyose no jutsu!" Another teen, this time with a shock of grey hair, sat atop a human-sized toad. "Yosh! Show them what we've got, Gamabunta!" The toad snorted in affirmative, and both toad and shinobi inhaled deeply. "Katon, Gamayu Endan! (Fire Element, Toad Oil Flame Bullet!)" The toad spat a globe of yellowish toad oil in the direction of the enemy group. Simultaneously, Jiraiya blew a stream of fire into the oil, igniting it. The Iwa-nins scattered mostly unscathed, but disoriented. Gamabunta burst through the dissipating flames, wakizashi drawn. It was surprisingly agile for its bulk, leaping here and hopping there, raining a flurry of blows on the enemy.

One of the Iwa-nin did a quick body flicker to Jiraiya, holding a kunai to his throat. "It's over, brat," he said grimly. _Hmph._ Jiraiya smirked. "It's over, but not for me." His unruly hair grew hard and spread over his body, encasing him in a protective shell of spikes. The Iwa-nin gurgled as he was stabbed by the spikes.

Just as the spikes retracted back to its normal size, another Iwa-nin headed for Jiraiya, his right hand forming a half Tiger seal. "Ninpou, Tsuchi no Yaiba!" A jagged stone blade coalesced from the air. _Shit! Too fast!_ Jiraiya covered his face with his arm instinctively in a futile attempt to block the blade.

But the expected blow did not fall.

Jiraiya opened his eyes slowly. A few snakes had impaled the Iwa-nin in numerous places, stopping him less than a foot from Jiraiya. "Pay attention, dobe. You're going to get yourself killed," a sneering voice remarked. Jiraiya scowled. "I don't need your help, Orochimaru." His pasty-faced teammate looked at the impaled Iwa-nin, his blade of stone crumbling into the dust, and smirked. "Seems like you did."

Four Iwa-nins approached and surrounded Sarutobi. Unfazed and calm, he performed a series of hand seals, ending in the Monkey seal. "Magen, Yamazaru Naraku! (Demonic Illusion, Ape Purgatory!)" Their surroundings faded into hellish semi-darkness, as numerous small primate hands clawed at the Iwa-nins' foot, securing them in place. In the genjutsu, more of these small, demonic-looking monkeys emerged from the ground, their jaws agape in a wail of untold sorrow and malice. The Iwa-nins screamed in terror, immobilized as they slowly suffocated under the influence of genjutsu.

When they collapsed, Sarutobi called out to his team. "Be careful. The Iwa-nins we are up against are of at least Chunnin-level." As if to illustrate the point, a hand burst from the ground near where Tsunade was patching Danzo up. The tunneling Iwa-nin was fast, leaping towards Tsunade and the unconscious Danzou, drawing a kunai. But Tsunade reacted even faster, landing a lethal, chakra-infused punch at his ribcage, shattering his lungs and killing him instantly.

"I think there are still some of them in the trees," Tsunade muttered. Orochimaru nodded curtly, and made a few hand seals. "Futon, Daitoppa! (Wind Element, Great Breakthrough!)" A great gust of wind shook the trees of the entire area hard. Some trees fell down, and there was some movement in the shadows. "They're running away!" Jiraiya said.

Orochimaru bit his right thumb, and smeared the blood on his left arm, where there were some arcane-looking symbols. "Kuchiyose, Tajuu Orochi!" Hundreds of venomous-looking snakes appeared on the ground, writhing restlessly. On Orochimaru's order, they slithered away into the forest. He unsheathed his straight-bladed sword, the Kunasagi, and ran into the forest, followed by his teammates.

Orochimaru was faster, disappearing with his snakes into the greenery ahead of Sarutobi and Jiraiya. By the time they found Orochimaru, he was already cornering six unfortunate Iwa-nins, genins by the look of them, who did not escape in time, surrounded by snakes. "W-wait! We surrender! P-please do not kill us," one of them stammered in fear. When Orochimaru and his snakes continued to close in on the Iwa-nins, Sarutobi barked, "That's enough, Orochimaru!"

Orochimaru scowled, but he dispelled his summoned snakes. "Got it, Sarutobi-sensei."

Then, without warning, snakes extended from under his sleeves and shot towards the prisoners. Before either Sarutobi or Jiraiya could do anything, the snakes had already run the Iwa-nin through their hearts.

For a moment, Sarutobi and Jiraiya were too stunned to speak. The utter silence of the forest was only punctuated by the quiet, maniacal chuckles of Orochimaru. Then Jiraiya spoke up. "Orochimaru! Why did you kill those people? They had already surrendered! They-"

"Shut up." Orochimaru interrupted, licking his lips slowly, as if savouring the moment. His face was contorted in a mask of malicious glee. Sarutobi looked disturbed, but said nothing. "Let's get back."

As they walked back to Tsunade and Danzo, Jiraiya stole a sideways glance at Orochimaru. He was his old, aloof self again. _Orochimaru…… what the hell happened to you back there?_

* * *

Nara Shikada stopped dead in his tracks as he surveyed the carnage in front of him. Dozens of bodies littered the ground, all of them Iwa-nin, from their attire. There had obviously been a vicious battle not long ago, but- Shikada narrowed his eyes. He was leading a team of reinforcements for the army in the fort, under the order of Niidaime-sama, for the very purpose of destroying this army.

A ninja leapt down from above. "Why have we stopped, Shikada-taicho? The-" He was cut in midsentence by the sight of the smouldering battlefield in front of him. "Shikada-taicho, what…"

"Oi, Shikada!" Shikada glanced in the direction of the call. "Sarutobi-san!" he recognized the man as his former teammate. He was flanked by two teenage shinobi, presumably his students. "What… what's going on, Sarutobi? Did you destroy this army?"

"My team and I did this together," Sarutobi said, with a measure of pride.

"Yeah, we helped!" another teen, this time a blonde kunoichi, chipped in from a few metres to Shikada's left. She had a human-sized slug beside her, carrying an injured man.

Shikada whistled lowly, surveying the carnage. "Incredible…… after all these years, you never fail to amaze me, Sarutobi-san."

_Incredible._

* * *

**  
A/N: Same with previous chapter, slight revisions, especially to Orochimaru's burst of cruelty near the end of the chapter. Nothing that alters the dynamic of the scene though. Still the same request, criticise criticise criticise! **


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